The Strange Economics of the Industrial Square Meter in Mexico

The ranges overlap, however, indicating that geography alone is not enough to explain the differences between markets. The type of activity in industrial space also matters, as each production process combines workers, machinery, and infrastructure differently and, in doing so, changes the relationship between space and employment.

The clearest association appears in electronics manufacturing. Among the markets analyzed, those where the manufacturing of computers, communications equipment, measuring equipment and other electronic components accounts for a larger share of manufacturing employment also tend to record more jobs per 1,000 square meters of industrial inventory³.

However, the relationship is not mechanical. In Tijuana and Mexicali, for example, electronics manufacturing accounts for about 18% of manufacturing employment in both markets, but Tijuana records nearly 45 jobs per 1,000 square meters, compared with 37 in Mexicali. Part of the difference lies in the rest of their manufacturing mix. “Miscellaneous manufacturing,” for example, accounts for 23.6% of employment in Tijuana and 14.6% in Mexicali, a difference that arithmetically amounts to nearly 70% of the gap observed between the two markets⁴. This means similar electronics manufacturing can coexist with different relationships between employment and space when the rest of the manufacturing mix changes.

Overall, the relationship between space and employment can help anticipate how the tenant mix may change the surrounding environment a park needs to grow, as each activity places different demands on the area around it. A concentration of labor-intensive processes may make access to transportation, housing, and services more important, while a greater presence of capital-intensive processes may shift pressure toward energy, water, or specialized infrastructure. For a developer, therefore, the manufacturing mix not only determines who occupies the buildings; it can also determine which infrastructure ultimately limits expansion.

That dynamic is clearer at a more concrete scale. FINSA’s industrial portfolio is one example, with 28 parks across different markets occupied by a range of manufacturing and logistics activities.

In García, Nuevo León, FINSA’s new park is expected to generate more than 14,000 direct jobs, in a state where its other six parks had already generated more than 33,000. In Aguascalientes, a single park accounts for about 25,000 jobs, while five developments across Puebla and Querétaro account for just under 70,000. The scale becomes larger when looking at the entire portfolio: FINSA reports 3.9 million square meters under lease and 350,000 jobs generated⁵.

Viewed as units of production rather than just real estate assets, these parks show that two expansions of equal size can add very different amounts of employment. That difference means that as a market's manufacturing mix changes, it may need more or less space to support the same level of employment, or more or less employment to occupy the same amount of space.

However, the relationship can also be viewed from a leasing perspective, considering that companies demand industrial space according to the needs of their production processes. Under that logic, understanding the labor intensity of different activities adds information about the underlying source of real estate demand because it helps explain not only how much space a company may require, but also what kind of operation is driving that need.

FINSA’s projection of more than 14,000 direct jobs for García is consistent with that reading. The figure alone does not indicate future demand for space. Still, it adds a production dimension to the expected scale of the development and shows that the park can be viewed in terms of both the square meters it will offer and the activity it expects to accommodate.

In that sense, an industrial square meter is not only a measure of space, but also of what can happen within it. See how many square meters FINSA has available for you on SiiLA SPOT or contact us at contacto@siila.com.mx.

¹ SiiLA analysis using data from INEGI’s 2024 Economic Censuses, whose data correspond to 2023, and the industrial inventory monitored by SiiLA as of the fourth quarter of 2023. For each market, total manufacturing employment (NAICS 31-33) in the municipalities assigned by SiiLA to its submarkets was added together and divided by industrial inventory, with the result expressed per 1,000 square meters. The year 2023 was used to keep employment and inventory aligned in time. When multiple submarkets corresponded to the same municipality, their inventory was aggregated, and municipal employment was counted only once. The indicator reflects a territorial relationship between the two datasets, not the number of workers physically employed in the properties monitored by SiiLA.

² For purposes of this analysis, SiiLA grouped the 12 markets included as follows: border states, Tijuana, Mexicali, Ciudad Juárez, Saltillo, Monterrey and Reynosa; Bajío, Aguascalientes, Guadalajara, Guanajuato, Querétaro and San Luis Potosí; Central Zone, Mexico City, five municipalities in the State of Mexico and one in Hidalgo. The ranges correspond to the minimum and maximum values observed within each group.

³ The analysis compared the share of manufacturing employment represented by each subsector in each market with its ratio of manufacturing employment to industrial inventory. For computer and electronic product manufacturing (NAICS 334), the 10 markets with sufficient published data were used; Guanajuato and San Luis Potosí were excluded because they did not have published municipal values for this subsector. The Pearson correlation was 0.744 (p=0.014) and the Spearman correlation was 0.648 (p=0.043), the strongest positive associations observed among the subsectors analyzed. The results show statistical association, not causation.

⁴ “Miscellaneous manufacturing” corresponds to NAICS subsector 339. The percentage results are derived from arithmetically decomposing the difference in manufacturing employment per 1,000 square meters of industrial inventory between Tijuana and Mexicali based on observed employment by subsector. The calculation does not imply causation.

⁵ The figures of 28 industrial parks, 3.9 million square meters under lease, and 350,000 jobs generated correspond to information published by FINSA. The company presents these figures as indicators of its operations but does not establish a direct correspondence between leased space and jobs generated; therefore, no jobs-per-square-meter ratio was calculated for the portfolio. Employment figures associated with specific parks were obtained from FINSA releases and, when unavailable from corporate sources, from information published by news outlets.